How Much Trash is Poetry Worth?

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Poetry for Trash at Rhinos

Poetry for Trash has another new home! And this is the coolest thing: this station is a gift from the Crestmont Boy’s & Girl’s Club Kids who built it with the help of the Hope Builders. Gift Economy in the works!!!

The good folks at Rhinos, an amazing after school program for the coolest teens that I’ve met in Bloomington just decorated their PFT station using old magazines and it looks pretty rad:

It will be standing right next to the front door, and serve as an activity center for these cool cats to stock with their own collage poems and continue decorating it with photos from magazines.

(Special thanks to Liv, the one with the thumbs up, for setting up this workshop!!!)

We talked about the history of gift economics, especially the Greek rite of xenia, the code of guest-host friendship. In sum, back then, in a world without hotels or shopping malls, if you were on a multiple day trip to another city, you needed to rely on the generosity of strangers to take you in, feed you, bathe you, and equip you with provisions for the rest of your journey. And when the time came to be the host, you’d do the same for them (or anyone else for that matter). This code of xenia, was very important to Greek civilization because it was a way in which neighbors took care of each other. And poets back in the day lived off this generosity–when they showed up to town, people would gather around and throw a party because they were going to have the ancient world’s equivalent of a rock-news-history-show. The clever cats at Rhinos pointed out that this is the same as a band going on tour, and that people will host them for the night at their houses and give them provisions so they can go to the next show.

We also talked about ways to save the world. And compassion–picking up trash and dishing out good vibes. And how when we listen to a band we like we feel inspired to make more music, or when we see a cool drawing or painting we want to draw more too. And we talked about all the non-profits, like Rhinos, and other gift economies around us that make Bloomington such a beautiful place to live.

Thanks so much for letting me hang out and for being rad, Rhinos. Poetry for Trash has found a super cool home.